AM Alert: Pols pick up the pieces after for-profit college shutdown

About three months after the sudden closure of Corinthian Colleges, a for-profit education group, left students with incomplete degrees and credits some feared wouldn’t be transferable, legislators are holding a joint oversight hearing to discuss what lessons regulators learned from those students’ stories.

The hearing comes as Assembly Bill 573, which would provide benefits to students affected by Corinthian, awaits a hearing in the Senate. Those benefits would include waived community college fees.

Representatives from CalVet and the state’s Bureau for Private Postsecondary Education will testify in front of members of the Assembly’s Veterans Affairs and Higher Education committees. A statement from Higher Education Committee Chair Jose Medina, D-Riverside, says many of the students affected by for-profit shutdowns were veterans using their GI-bill benefits.

Attorney General Kamala Harris’ office will also be represented. Harris played an integral role in shutting down Corinthian when she sued it, saying the company “continued to deceive its students to the end.”

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KIDS AT THE CAPITOL: An SEIU group is bringing in youth to talk about one of the issues at the top of Senate President Pro Tem Kevin De León’s agenda: wage theft. His Senate Bill 588, which toughens regulations on businesses who skip employee paychecks. The bill is moving through the Assembly.

Children Over Politics, a Service Employees International Union project that advocates for progressive causes affecting children, is holding a press conference at 11 a.m. today on the south steps. The “youth leaders” featured at the event are also set to discuss environmental justice and universal healthcare.

THE BAN BAN: The Senate judiciary committee is considering a constitutional amendment that would restrict public colleges in California from banning the U.S. flag. The move follows controversy earlier in the year.

The hearing starts at 1:30 p.m. in room 4203. The flag measure will be the first item considered.